CUERO – Phylis Canion is mystified, baffled and, at one point, she was a little bit frightened.

What exactly is the mysterious animal that she has seen on her property: the storied Chupacabra, a coyote with mange, or some breeding experiment gone horribly wrong?

The story begins two Saturdays ago when Canion got a call. She was told one of the animals she had first seen on her property about two years ago had been hit by a car and killed. Canion’s property is on Buenger Road off U.S. Highway 183 south of Cuero.

“I had seen one three or four times on our place, but it’s very elusive. So, when I got the call that one had been killed, I got it and took it back to the house,” Canion said. “It’s a strange-looking animal. It has short front legs and longer back legs. The paws on the front are different than the ones on the back, and it has no hair. The nose is very long. The tip of the nose is longer than the lower jaw, and the front teeth stick out, almost like fangs. They are the ugliest things I have ever seen in my life.”

Canion said that after she first saw the animal on her property, she began losing kittens during the night.

“I don’t know if it was related or not, so I began to set a chicken out at night,” she said. “I would find the chicken the next day with all the blood drained out. The carcass was left behind. The scariest thing that happened was the day I found the chicken on my back porch. All the blood was sucked out, and there was not one drop of blood on my porch.”

Canion said a neighboring property owner has reported a sheep found devoid of blood.

“Others I have talked to have seen it, too,” Canion said. “But they didn’t tell anyone because they were afraid people would think they are crazy.”

DeWitt County Extension Agent Anthony Netardus looked at the photographs of the carcass of the mysterious animal. “I’d rather defer to the experts, but it looks to me like it might be a coyote with a severe case of mange,” he said.

Canion called in a local game warden who admitted he didn’t know what the animal was and took her photographs to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department in Austin, Canion said.

“They said it’s not a mangy coyote,” she said.

Local veterinarian Robert Beer also examined the photographs. “I can’t say for sure without actually examining the animal, especially the head. But it looks like a coyote with mange. I have seen this in coyotes and foxes. It could even be a domestic dog,” he said.

Canion said she will soon be sending a “sample” to Texas A&M for DNA testing.

“I have also sent the pictures to National Geographic, and they wrote back and said they would be in touch soon,” Canion said.

She has her own theory about why at least three of these animals have been seen in recent days. Another was killed near her property, and one was killed near the Guadalupe River bridge, both hit by cars.

“We don’t see ever see three coyotes dead on the road,” Canion said. “Why all of a sudden? I think they must live in a hole, in a den. We’ve had more than 20 inches of rain at our house recently, and I think it forces them out of their holes.”

“I have also heard a rumor, but haven’t been able to substantiate it, that some years ago some experiments were done breeding different species. So who knows what this might be?” Canion said.

She thinks the mystery will soon be solved.

“Between Texas A&M and National Geographic, I bet we can come up with some answers,” she said.Sonny Long
Victoria Advocate

About Craig WoolheaterCo-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films:
OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.

Well-for ONCE, it seems-we not only have pictures of a carcass, but the good folks at Texas A &M are actually going to run some DNA tests. It looks quite canine, and nothing like drawings made based upon eyewitness accounts of the ‘chupa’; the only link between the chupa and this beast being the blood-drained carcasses of chickens and a sheep. This should be interesting; thank you Craig for sharing this and I for one will be awaiting further developements.

It’s just an ugly, mangy coyote, possibly dog. No mystery here. If anyone has ever seen a dog with the mange, you know how ugly and grayed the skin can get from the infection. If anyone has been around a dog with the mange, you know you can get it, too. NO FUN.

I’m pretty confident this “beast” is an American Hairless Terrier. A rare breed of dog that is completly hairless and is an offshoot of the Rat Terrier family (notice the rat-like tail in the photo.)

I know a bit about these animals since I have one as a pet. In addition, if this was some other animal suffering from mange, it would have some hair patches on various parts of its body. This guy is completely bare like my little Foo-Foo (that’s not really her name 🙂 )

Yea it’s a dog. I’ve seen dogs with bad mange (when I worked in grooming shops) and they are hideous. Just cause something’s bald, doesn’t mean its an undocumented creature :-/
Any animal can be bald. And, yes, there are dog breeds that are bred to be hairless as well.
It just looks like a hairless dog. Nothing unusual.

I think it’s totally bald. I thought at first it had a strip of fur down its head and back, but it was just the shadowing on the paper he’s laying on.
It’s some kind of canine though. And it looks more like a domestic dog’s shape than it does a fox or coyote, but its an awkward camera angle too.
He doesn’t look too healthy, so its possible its a breed/species that is normally furry but lost it due to sickness. The skin looks a bit mangey to me, and the stomach looks bloated- not an overweight dog b/c the rest of him is scrawny, but the stomach looks oddly puffy for the lanky proportions of the animal.
But if it’s a dog breed that is bred for no fur (like a hairless terrier, or a mexican hairless, etc.) the skin could have just gotten rotten-looking from sun damage since they have very sensitive skin.

I bet most of you people who say its just mange, read the quotes and said “mange… that sounds good.” Its like if they found bigfoot and sombody said, “nope… thats just a gorilla. But why its seven ft tall and walking upright, I haven’t the foggiest.”

I, for one, have personally dealt with dogs who had mange. So no I am not just jumping on the bandwagon and saying mange for the heck of it.

I have worked with dogs, been to enough dog shows, owned dogs, studied dogs, etc. and am pretty knowledgeable about them. This animal just screams ‘canine’.

I am not a skeptic by any means and do believe there are many cryptids out there undiscovered. But believing in cryptids doesn’t mean I am gonna get excited at every misidentified common animal either.

Most people don’t know what they are looking at, which is the reason why common animals get misidentified as cryptids, as well as the reason cryptids get misidentified as common animals.

I am a believer in the strange, but IMO this is no cryptid.

We’ve already had manged canines (dogs, foxes, etc) misidentified as chupacabras and hyenas. This is most definitely another case of that.

I want a real chupa photo as bad as anyone else, but it’s very disappointing that every time I see an article saying “Chupacabra Photos” it’s a bald dog.

craig, thanks for explaining why my computer seemed possessed. I saw the above picture, but according to the story I read on unknowncountry.com that looks nothing like the elmendorf beast. Legs are proportioned properly for a canine. The snout looks canine as well as the jaw is the correct proportion to the snout. This one is a cute coyote with major mange, poor thing.

To me, it looks like a fox that got hit with the ugly stick one too many times. Small paws, long slender snout, slender legs, it definitely seems like a type of fox. I’m with the rest of you and not gonna jump to the mange conclusion.

Besides, how did the chupacabra of Latin America which stood on two legs, had a head like a gray alien and giant eyes magically poof into a really ugly dog?

Well the back feet almost resemble the feet of a rodent, such as rabit but what this animal really does look like is a really malnourished Xoloitzcuintle or Xolo, which is a kind of hairless dog, such as the one here.
the idea that an animal sucked the blood out of an animal seems somewhat unethical, there is not enough nutrients in blood alone to keep an animal like this alive and also one with a muzzle like this dog was meant to eat solid food such as meat. soo…yah

The pic of this poor Baby breaks my heart. It looks like my dog, an ITALIAN GREYHOUND. A mini version of the full size Greyhound. Once they get free to run you can”t call them back. Running at 25 mph on a mission to hunt, but not suck blood. They have very short thin hair and yes it probably did have mange. Their top jaw overlaps their bottom jaw and they have a deep chest. Iggies, as they are called, have a humped back, legs 11 to 13 in. long, only around 4 1/2 in wide body weighing between 6 to 8 lbs. ITALIAN GREYHOUNDs get lost a lot because of the No call back once they get free they are gone and you have a 50/50 chance of seeing your dog again. Sad!!